Your Right to Know

A defiant state GOP yesterday rejected calls from the Ohio Bar Association to stop airing
political ads on behalf of Supreme Court Justice Robert R. Cupp that accuse his Democratic
challenger of being soft on rapists.

“We will not be taking the ad down,” said Republican Party spokesman Matt Henderson.

“Judges speak through their opinions, and it’s appropriate, proper and fair to bring those
opinions to light during a campaign,” Henderson said.

The bar’s Election Campaign Advertising Monitoring Committee unanimously found “the ad is
misleading, impugns the candidate’s integrity and erodes the public trust and confidence in the
judiciary.”

And reminding Cupp that he signed a “clean-campaign pledge,” the bar committee urged the justice
to “go further in his renunciation of the ad by requesting that the Ohio Republican Party cease its
airing and use in any form.”

In response, Cupp, who had denounced the spot earlier but stopped short of asking that it be
removed, yesterday asked his party leaders to comply with the bar committee’s request.

“Justice Cupp and his campaign disavowed and criticized the state party’s independent ad the
moment we found out about it, and we call on the state party to remove it from all forms of public
distribution,” said Mark Weaver, spokesman for Cupp’s campaign.

The bar evaluated the spot in response to a complaint filed this week by the Ohio Democratic
Party.

With Cupp locked in a tight race for re-election against former Cleveland appellate court judge
William M. O’Neill, state Republicans unveiled the spot earlier this week, claiming that O’Neill
showed sympathy toward a rapist in a 2000 opinion he wrote overturning the man’s conviction.

State Democrats immediately demanded it be taken down, calling it “slanderous” and “demeaning”
to rape victims and their families.

The ad stems from the opinion in which O’Neill wrote: “Rape is a crime of violence which
ultimately devastates the lives of at least two people. It is beyond question that the victim
suffers emotional damage. The perpetrator, on the other hand, is labeled for life as a rapist and
left to lead a life of rejection and scorn by society as a whole. For these reasons, it is the duty
of all courts to insure that justice is served for both parties.” The 3-0 ruling included another
Democrat and a Republican and sent the case back to the trial court for a second trial.

“The committee’s reading of this indicates that then-Judge O’Neill was performing his duties as
a judge, expressing a commitment to preserving justice for all parties. “It also bears noting that
this rape conviction was ultimately overturned unanimously by a three-judge panel,” committee
Chairwoman Maxine Thomas wrote in a letter to Republicans.

The committee serves as a public watchdog “to see that advertising stays focused on judicial
qualifications and does not deteriorate into name calling and negativism.”

The ad was created by The Strategy Group for Media, based near Powell. Strategy Group is headed
by Rex Elsass, a consultant to dozens of GOP candidates and officials, including Gov. John Kasich.
Strategy Group also did an apology ad by Todd Akin after the Republican congressman running for the
U.S. Senate in Missouri said women’s bodies have ways of preventing pregnancy in the case of
rape.